Sir Adolphus has no delicacy.  He burst out laughing.

“Oh, I see,” he cried out, simply bursting with amusement.  “You thought Forbes-Gaskell was Colonel Clay in disguise!  Oh, my stars, what a lovely one!”

“You, at least, have no right to laugh,” Charles responded, drawing himself up and growing still redder.  “You led me once into a similar scrape, and then backed out of it in a way unbecoming a gentleman.  Besides,” he went on, getting angrier at each word, “this fellow, whoever he is, has been trying to cheat me on his own account.  Colonel Clay or no Colonel Clay, he’s been salting my rocks with gold-bearing quartz, and trying to lead me on into an absurd speculation!”

Sir Adolphus exploded.  “Oh, this is too good,” he cried.  “I must go and tell Marmy!” And he rushed off to where Forbes-Gaskell was seated on a corner of rock with Amelia.

As for Charles and myself, we returned to the house.  Half an hour later Forbes-Gaskell came back, too, in a towering temper.

“What is the meaning of this, sir?” he shouted out, as soon as he caught sight of Charles.  “I’m told you’ve invited my wife and myself here to your house in order to spy upon us, under the impression that I was Clay, the notorious swindler!”

“I thought you were,” Charles answered, equally angry.  “Perhaps you may be still!  Anyhow, you’re a rogue, and you tried to bamboozle me!”

Forbes-Gaskell, white with rage, turned to his trembling wife.  “Gertrude,” he said, “pack up your box and come away from these people instantly.  Their pretended hospitality has been a studied insult.  They’ve put you and me in a most ridiculous position.  We were told before we came here—­and no doubt with truth—­that Sir Charles Vandrift was the most close-fisted and tyrannical old curmudgeon in Scotland.  We’ve been writing to all our friends to say ecstatically that he was, on the contrary, a most hospitable, generous, and large-hearted gentleman.  And now we find out he’s a disgusting cad, who asks strangers to his house from the meanest motives, and then insults his guests with gratuitous vituperation.  It is well such people should hear the plain truth now and again in their lives; and it therefore gives me the greatest pleasure to tell Sir Charles Vandrift that he’s a vulgar bounder of the first water.  Go and pack your box, Gertrude!  I’ll run down to the Cromarty Arms, and order a cab to carry us away at once from this inhospitable sham castle.”

“You wear a wig, sir; you wear a wig,” Charles exclaimed, half-choking with passion.  For, indeed, as Forbes-Gaskell spoke, and tossed his head angrily, the nature of his hair-covering grew painfully apparent.  It was quite one-sided.

“I do, sir, that I may be able to shake it in the face of a cad!” the Professor responded, tearing it off to readjust it; and, suiting the action to the word, he brandished it thrice in Charles’s eyes; after which he darted from the room, speechless with indignation.